The print server is already in production serving MacOS and Windows like a charm for a couple of years. CUPS provides a great API to program the print server and writing your own drivers.Would be awesome to show available printers in the Chooser.But from what I read here in the forum, AppleTalk support gets tricky.

I already have BasiliskII up and running using AppleShare on macOS Sierra. Also the Chooser for AppleShare lists available AFP servers in the local net, but AppleTalk is a different beast.

Do you have experience with CUPS in relation to AppleTalk?For today I‘ll try to connect BII via IPP or LPD.

Depending on your version of Debian, you could install a2server and have it share the printer via PAP (AppleTalk Printer Access Protocol). I have written a guide on how to build and install an AppleTalk print server. As I gather from your posts you would probably recognize the parts of the guide you need.

In my case the server shares an old AppleTalk printer to modern systems via CUPS. As you want to do the opposite you wouldn't actually need the PAP backend mentioned in the guide. See https://emaculation.com/doku.php/applet ... osx#fn__24 (note #24) for a link explaining how to do it the way you require.

If you don't succeed with AppleTalk (or rather not use it), the bridge setup might help to establish the connection using LPD.

I took this afternoon and evening to set up my print server with your instructions.This is a different machine than the file sharing one, so no worries.

Same result: File Sharing works great, but I can't see any shared printers.Same service runs great with recent macOS builds, but no success with Macintosh Classic environment and a genuine SE/30 connected to the same LAN.

I have no idea, I'm afraid. The only thing that catches my eye is that your first line reads "LaserWriter@A2SERVER:\" i.s.o. "LaserWriter:\" as written in the reddit.com guide. But then again that could be correct and even required as you are using "A2SERVER" i.s.o. the standard AppleTalk zone "*".

I don't have that much knowledge about all that stuff. That is also why it took me a lot of time to build the AppleTalk server and write the guide. I try to gather the information I find so others can profit from it as well. But it was yet others who shared all the bits of knowledge I required to build the system. Those are the actual "specialists".

Myself, I have never tried to share a non-AppleTalk printer via AppleTalk. I just thought it would be nice to reference the post at reddit.com which adespoton pointed to originally. But if you can figure it out I will gladly add a link to your solution in the guide.

KnuddlMac wrote:

IP connectivity is provided as I can write/read from the AppleShare on the same system

Do you mean write/read from A2SERVER? If not, could you try? And if it works via IP, switch that off in classic Mac OS to force it to connect using AppleTalk. Does that work? If yes, I don't know why PAP doesn't work. If not, something is blocking transfer via AppleTalk.You might think through your network topology. E.g., I once had a switch that wasn't able to transport AppleTalk.

BasiliskII on macOS Sierra, an old SE/30 and a Quicksilver with Classic OS9 are finally running with Apple Share and Printing via Ethernet!

Your hint about the AppleTalk zone was the triggering element. - I did notice that since I ran A2SERVER my other AppleShare (without specific 'ZONE') did vanish and the AppleTalk ControlPanel did state that the Mac is connected to zone 'A2SERVER'. In order to test impact, I removed the zone info from A2SERVER, restarted NETATALK on the Linux and le voilá, on the Mac the print job did finish with success. - But no printer output!

In the next step I tested with the

Code:

lp -P printer filename

and

Code:

lpr -P printer filename

command on the Linux console what yields in a successful print. - OK, Mac works, Linux works, but they are like old people and don't talk with each other!

After a bit of twiggeling, amending the /usr/local/etc/netatalk/papd.conf file with the correct spooler entry did make the trick:

This was a long trial, and mostly caused by a munch of different components on my Linux board. - I was running CUPS 1.7.5 and put the A2SERVER on top of it. The result was a confusing mess of config files with different versioning.

Now I need a break and will create step-by-step guides on:

[1] How to set-up BasiliskII with full AppleShare and Printing support via Ethernet on a macOS Sierra

[2] Set-up a netatalk and CUPS Server

Especially the 2nd bullet is compelling, as I am running a 10€ old HP LaserJet 2550 and a 40€ Linux board.This was the best Macintosh System 7 extension since I bought my PowerBook100 !

We must be almost at the place where someone could buy a simple C.H.I.P. or Pi Zero and drop a preconfigured image on it for instant AppleShare file serving from System 2 through OS X 10.13. I think most of the missing pieces have been filled in over the past year.

Thanks to Thomas Kaiser et al for File Sharing and Net Boot, the A2SERVER image for the RasPi could do the trick.Printing is disabled by default, maybe too dependent on the type of printer being used.

I think I‘ve seen an image somewhere over the past week.

Same should apply for the C.H.I.P. based configuration.Would be great to have a plug&play system available. Still the commercial distribution could be difficult. Some ship the SBC as a seperate SKU to the SD–Card. So for the C.H.I.P. I‘d guess a downloadable image file could solve it.

The automated configuration could becoma a challenge. In general it was necessary to start the console for one or the other parameter. But you are right, it is really getting more and more easy to run a Linux based system without expert level knowledge. J

According to that site the image has an outdated version of A2SERVER and some other stuff. But there's an easy way to update everything with just one command. Printing capabilities have to be added manually.

I'm using my Banana Pi based A2SERVER AppleTalk NAS with printer sharing since more than a year now and it still runs flawlessly. Looks like Ivan Drucker did a really good job with A2SERVER.